On Rothko and the Portland Retrospective (Part 6): I visit with the Rothko clan and my narcissism gets the best of me.

I’ll make this post brief because I’m confident that it’s mainly for myself. I had the amazing honor, last Sunday, of being the photographer for Christopher Rothko’s post-lecture private family reception. My friend Dena, who is also a friend of the Rothko family, helped me to secure the gig and I think I did a nice job for them. The event was held in the Miller Gallery at the Portland Art Museum. I’ve wanted to meet Christopher and Kate for years and this weekend I had my chance. As an added bonus, I got to meet another 50 or 60 folks from across the Rothkowitz family tree. I know I was there to take photos for them, because, after all, theywere paying me. But just for a moment, my narcissism got the best of me and I had someone fire off this shot:

I’ll obviously never get to meet the great artist himself (who died when I was 10). But the son, who has devoted so much time to bringing his father’s writings to life; and the daughter, whose lawsuit against her father’s executors and one of the world’s most powerful galleries (when she was barely out of her teens) rocked the art world and successfully brought something like 800 paintings back to the Rothko estate; were equally amazing people. It was very cool to meet them and we feel blessed to have done so.

Yes, I am supposed to stick to Rothko in my writings about the Portland Retrospective. But, like my discussion of the kids at Rothko Chapel, this was a Rothko-related experience worth documenting. Perhaps this is only for me. But, hey, it ismy BLOG!